how many of powerful beings and/or high-level characters do you think is appropriate in a typical fantasy world?

[bloodtide]

The Classic Forgotten Realms, back in 2E, had the median level of Toril as 10th. So roughly half of the world was above and half the world was below 10th level.

Though it is not an even spread, as most people are in the 1-3 level and 11-12 level.

A typical average person starts at 1st level at 20 years old, and gains a level every three years. So roughly they will be 10th level at age 50. And then need five years to gain a level, so often they would top out at 12th level at age 60.

The other people, with more active lives, might level up much faster and account for the higher levels in the world.

The 'average' ruler is around 10th level, the vague 7-12 range.

Most mundane characters don't get much flashy that effects the world. A lot of what they get is more vague. Such as charisma effecting people.

The Realms also makes a firm line between the characters that just use magic and the character that have a real talent for magic.

It should also be noted that back in 2E, it was common to have characters of all abilities. So you could have a high level character, with low ability scores, that would not exactly be as powerful as they should be 'on paper'.

Getting up to 20th level is rare, so the Realms only has around 500, but they don't all seek places of power.

 

[Anonym]

Depends on the nature of the setting.

No/very low magic worlds can probably only handle a handful per continent. Each archmage and champion would be powerful enough to take over a city with little substantial threat of being overthrown. Incredibly old dragons and such could rule entire swaths of land casually. To many and these beings are competing with each other so much, that every one is dead within a few battles.

Low magic worlds could perhaps handle a few more, as once an “age” a band of people could overthrow or even kill one of them. In this world, the high-level mages and most dragons are still almost untouchable.

Worlds with “average” levels of magic start to treat high-level characters (mages, champions, etc.) more like legendary figures rather than unconquerable beings. With enough grit and preperation (or pure force), they can be destroyed. Dragons and similar creatures are still noteworthy, but there are probably more than a few tales of dragon slayers in these worlds.

High magic worlds will treat all such beings more like extremely prominent figureheads in their field. A 20th level NPC is more akin a celebrity than a nation’s ruler or rumored to be a deity. At this range, dragons are still mighty, but only the oldest of them seem to be substantial threats. Archfiends and such still remain legendary as they are a plane or two away.

Epic level and mythic level magic worlds throw it all into a blender. NPCS being 20th level might be considered above average or even just middle-of-the-pack. More than a few times in a single lifetime, apocalypses are started and averted regularly, fiend lords overthrown more than once, and dragons being slain happens often. Gods may have a heavy hand in such worlds, as the people lone may threaten to tear it all apart if not supervised. In these lands, legends and myths are created every season, and many still walk their worlds.

For a world like Faerun, i would put it somewhere between middle and high level magic, treating the many published high-level entities as all there is.

I think the key factor determining this is how powerful or the strength level of ordinary people in that world.
what if those people were powerful races like Kryptonians or Saiyans and everyone of them are high level characters?mighty epic guys will depreciate and become less shinny.

of course, the main problem they face will be that any street brawl may literally tear apart their country or even the entire continent.

 

[GreatestHonor]

I think the key factor determining this is how powerful or the strength level of ordinary people in that world.
what if those people were powerful races like Kryptonians or Saiyans and everyone of them are high level characters?mighty epic guys will depreciate and become less shinny.

of course, the main problem they face will be that any street brawl may literally tear apart their country or even the entire continent.

Fair point. I made the assumption that this was solely about normal people.

 

[Distracted DM]

In my mind, that's a Gameist vs Simulationist question:

"However many there should be to make the game fun," vs. "how many there should be for it to make sense in the world." How big is your setting? The party slays the ancient dragon when they're level 12; was one of several dozen ancient dragons in the world? Or one of hundreds, or of thousands?

This is the trouble I run into when running a bunch of games in a single setting, and things get to high level where the PCs are basically epic and can move mountains if they try hard enough. How's that going to affect the setting in other games, and in future adventures? Are all the dragons dead now? There are opportunities there, "now magic in the world is dying because all of the dragons are dead, go on a quest to bring them back," but that's easier said that done- it's a lot of work! And hopefully the next party wants to take up that cause!

I think this is why I prefer Sword & Sorcery as a genre over High Fantasy: Sword & Sorcery stories are much more personal, on smaller scales. But the system that you're working with is really going to determine what genre you're going to be able to run: D&D, from 2e to 5e, is going to gravitate towards high fantasy and world-shaking events unless you're hacking at it with some house-rules, like e6 or setting some other limits. So if you're running these high fantasy games, you're going to need a lot more powerful beings/high level characters. Eberron does present a bit of a change because it literally says "the highest level NPCs are 9th-ish level, the PCs are GOING to be way more powerful than them," which means that you're not going to be challenging the PCs with NPCs; it's going to be big monsters from tier 3 onwards.

So I guess to answer the question, I'd say that "typical fantasy world" isn't really defined enough. You'd need to specify the world further, or specify the game system.

If you're saying Toril, and 5e? Crap... hundreds of thousands? Millions? Are we counting the infinite planes, or just the mortal world?

 

[Smackpixi]

The thing missing in most adventures are the high level good guys. Cause many adventures have a high level BBEG that could break the adventure if he showed up with his mooks on day one. There is rarely an explanation as to why they do not. A sensible adventure sets up a WWI situation where the conflict is in a steady state and the PCs move the meter. Or, the enemy’s power is growing, like, on day one, much like the PCs, the enemy’s influence in the world is weak, but growing.

The world should have as many super powerful goods as bads to explain why the bads haven’t already taken over when the PCs arrive on the scene.

 

[Celebrim]

In a typical fantasy world (for example, the Faerun)

See, I disagree with the assumption here. Faerun is nothing like a typical fantasy world. When it was first introduced, my group balked at it intensely because it vastly increased the very thing you are talking about - "How prevalent is super heroic power?" Not only did Faerun about double what counted as high level, so that typical high level characters became 20th to 30th level, but it made high level characters much more common across the board.

This extends to every facet of Faerun. The Faerun retired adventurer running a bar in a small town is a 10th level Lord who would be a big deal in any other setting but Faerun. Armies in Faerun aren't composed of 0th or even 1st level characters with a smattering of higher-level leaders, but 3rd, 4th or even 5th level characters led by proportionately higher-level characters. Everything is exaggeratedly powerful beyond any fiction really prior to that point, and most fantasy fiction in general.

By contrast, speaking as someone who has read the Lord of the Rings 18 times, I think "Gandalf is a 5th level Magic-User" still holds up pretty well. It might not be entirely true, but it's certainly truer than "Gandalf is a 24th level Magic-User" or something of that sort. Gandalf is a unique Agathion with 7+7 HD and the ability to cast spells as a 6th level M-U is probably the limits of his power, but in Faerun terms this isn't a mover or shaker in world affairs but a pathetic sidekick that could get his butt handed to him by the average tavern drunk.

That in my opinion isn't really sustainable or interesting. Faerun is a world filled to the brim and overflowing with DM PCs that are the protagonists of the world, and any player characters are just witnesses to their greatness. That's not interesting.

 

[Fifinjir]

As obviously game-y as it might be, the best answer that comes to my head is that different power ranges congregate in different regions. Maybe the higher level beings have an agreement to keep lower-level beings in undisturbed “nature preserves”, and anyone who breaks that agreement will soon find a very eclectic alliance of what are usually enemies bearing down on them.

 

[kigmatzomat]

By contrast, speaking as someone who has read the Lord of the Rings 18 times, I think "Gandalf is a 5th level Magic-User" still holds up pretty well. It might not be entirely true, but it's certainly truer than "Gandalf is a 24th level Magic-User" or something of that sort. Gandalf is a unique Agathion with 7+7 HD and the ability to cast spells as a 6th level M-U is probably the limits of his power, but in Faerun terms this isn't a mover or shaker in world affairs but a pathetic sidekick that could get his butt handed to him by the average tavern drunk.

That in my opinion isn't really sustainable or interesting. Faerun is a world filled to the brim and overflowing with DM PCs that are the protagonists of the world, and any player characters are just witnesses to their greatness. That's not interesting.

That last part describes LotR. Gandalf is the DM PC, who has a bunch of hirelings carry the cursed items, and be distractions or cannon fodder. The Balrog scene is just a way to show how powerful Gandalf is to the players and then bring him back in his "ult" form later, after the PCs leveled up.

The Istari (incarnate Maia) were forbidden from direct conflict with Sauron and were to advise/counsel rather than be front-line blasters. Gandalf appeared to be the only one Istari who remained on Middle Earth who abided by that stricture. I suspect Gandalf was the "rogue" of the Istari, less wizard and more Arcane Trickster or maybe Bard.

Saruman broke the rules on power, which seems to make it a choice rather than an inherent limitation. Meaning Istari are "top tier" creatures, pretending to be lower CR, rather than actually being lower CR creatures. Given that balrogs are a corrupted form of Maia, that CR seems pretty high.

It's pretty clear that if Sauron's tower wasn't active, Gandalf and his hirelings could be zooming over the lands on the backs of giant eagles. As it is Gandalf has to schlep along on "the king of horses".

There are Ring Wraiths, that can only be killed after being injured by specifically enchanted blades, who can pop up anywhere. Unkillable threats seem pretty high level. Then there are semi-immortal elves who have fought in multiple wars and are capable of resisting the pull of the One Ring, and you've got a world with quite a lot of high level NPCs. And this is just one continent! The Elven lands are probably pretty epic.

 

[Piperken]

...this means that these powerful beings have less social and economic dependencies. a powerful great wyrm's territory might only have a poor village that raises pigs and fish for it. but that dragon is really powerful enough to take on an entire army...

...or should the number of these powerful beings be more arbitrary since their power is not actually based on the size of territory and population like the rulers on Earth.?

In this hypothetical, I feel it matters quite a bit what the motivations of the powerful great wyrm or powerful beings are, and in what ways those may change over time depending on the (hopefully) growing influence of the players at your table.

 

[Li Shenron]

The 2nd edition Player’s Option High Level Campaigns had a demographic breakdown from level 1 to level 18 that broke down like this:

An 18th level NPC was 1 per every million in overall population.

17th level had 2 per every million, 16th level had 4 per every million, 15th had 8 per million and so on.

Kind of off the cuff but would probably be suitable for most purposes. I imagine that a setting like Forgotten Realms would immediately break that rule.

Uhm... wouldn't you end up with basically 25% of the entire population having class levels? That's quite a lot and not suitable for my preferences.